Thai fashion brand Pomelo banks $52m in series C round

Thailand-based Omnichannel fashion firm Pomelo has secured US$52 million in its series C round to bankroll its expansion across Asia.

Pomelo CEO David Jou / Photo credit: Pomelo

Central Group, Provident Growth Fund, InterVest Star SEA Growth Fund, Andre Hoffman, Toivo Annus, Lombard Private Equity, Ambient Sound Investments OU, and The Luxembourg Company Deverel participated in the round, which pushed Pomelo’s total funding to US$83 million.

According to its co-founder Casey Liang, the company is looking at big data and AI for pricing, design, and ecommerce personalization. “We want to integrate the omnichannel experience even deeper by connecting the Pomelo universe with the customer through a proprietary tech stack. Additionally, we would like to further expand our supply chain automation platform, Henry,” Liang said.

Since raising US$19 million in its series B round in November 2017, the startup has expanded to Hong Kong and Malaysia, launched eight physical shops in Thailand, and opened its flagship store in Singapore’s Orchard Road, the company said in a statement. It also claims to have grown its gross merchandise volume by 7x.

Along with this, the firm has broadened its product offerings, adding categories like menswear line Pomelo Man, cosmetics brand Beet, and eco-friendly collection Purpose.

“Pomelo is much more than an online fashion brand,” said the company’s CEO David Jou. “As a fashion-tech company, we are developing a proprietary catalog of innovative technologies that will allow us to unlock significant hidden value that exists in the branded fashion business today.”

The recent funding follows the appointment of Jean Thomas to serve as Pomelo’s new chief marketing officer. Thomas held the same role during his time at Lazada.